Newly employed at a geriatric rehabilitation center, painfully shy Pinky (Sissy Spacek) befriends chatty co-worker Millie (Shelley Duvall), and the two become roommates. A misfit harboring delusions of her own popularity, Millie takes out her vague frustrations on vulnerable Pinky; their circle of pain coming to encircle a male friend and his wife. Filmmaker Robert Altman deftly transforms the banal into the horrific in this astounding portrait of psychological exchange.

Restored by UCLA Film & Television Archive with funding provided by The Hollywood Foreign Press Association and The Film Foundation.

Come Back to the 5 & Dime, Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean (1982)

Directed by Robert Altman

Filmmaker Robert Altman's screen adaptation of Ed Graczyk's play (which Altman also directed on Broadway) relates the 20-year reunion of a James Dean fan club at a Woolworth's in a small Texas town. Older and wiser, club members, all of them women, recount their aspirations and failures, illuminating feminist themes of sexuality and power. While boasting a stellar ensemble cast, the film proved a breakthrough for Cher, in particular.